Pathways in Time
by Kesomon
Summary: A 5 part drabble collection spanning the bridge between the end of Doomsday and the start of Glitz and Glamour. Read and Review or yew shall be Ex.TERM.in.ate.ed!
1. Story 1: The Doctor and Mrs Sinclair

**Pathways in Time**

Summary: A collection of 5 short story drabbles, spanning the end of Doomsday to the beginning of Glitz and Glamour. Wanted to show the events leading up to Project Gallifrey, without having to write all those stories out completely. Narrated from the Doctor's perspective. All sorts of AU liberties were taken.

I do not own these characters. It vexes me so.

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**Story 1 – The Doctor and Mrs. Sinclair  
**_My take on The Runaway Bride._

He couldn't have asked for a worse migraine, the second she materialized out of thin air in her wedding dress, in the middle of his TARDIS no less.

He also couldn't have asked for a better distraction.

Caught up in the flurry of adrenaline and danger, chasing the stubborn-headed, no-nonsense Donna Sinclair across 1990's London, he barely had a chance to mourn for Rose, for words unsaid and feelings he had tried to suppress in his 10 lives. Not that he'd ever had much luck keeping his hearts in check.

The excitement, he supposed, was good - this regeneration wasn't meant to skulk in the darkest corner of the study, brooding in the light of a dying fire.

It didn't stop him aching when she finally got back home, and left him in the silent hum of his home away from home, fading into the Vortex, once more alone.


	2. Story 2: Doctor Jones, not Indiana

**Pathways in Time**

**Story 2 – Doctor Jones, not Indiana  
**_How the Doctor met Martha, or at least how I wish it would happen._

He spends a few years, not days, aimlessly adrift; putting his mind to other tasks, such as configuring a new Zero Room to the TARDIS, and doing repairs below the floor. He does a few test runs of systems, throws himself into a few wars on distant planets.

He doesn't go near the Sol system, or the little blue planet. Not for a long time.

Then a glitch in the space-time coordinates throws him into the not-so-far future and a little off-course from his original destination of Lerkos Hal, landing him smack in the middle of the gardens at the University of Mars under the Galactic Republic of Earth.

He reflects that it is somewhat silly that they call themselves the Galactic Republic, when they've barely touched the borders of their little tendril of the Milky Way.  
He's not laughing when he finds out the archeology students have woken up one of the forgotten tombs of the Ice Warriors, and they're bent on wiping the stupid apes off the face of their planet.

He finds an unlikely ally in the bright but brash young Martha Jones, MD-in-progress, and only once makes the obligatory reference to Earth media, earning a withering look from Doctor "call me Indiana again and I'll leave you strapped to this Wa'rios operating table" Jones.

He later agrees it isn't as amusing when Martha accidentally trips a hidden booby-trap, and they're running for their lives with a spherical robotic defense drone tearing after them like a bloody great boulder.

When the Warriors are finally sent back into stasis, and he seals up their tomb (for good, he hopes) he doesn't need to ask her twice to come with him. He doesn't even have to ask once.

He found her in the cloisters two hours after dematerialization.


	3. Story 3: Companionship and Crynoids

**Pathways in Time**

**Story 3 – Companionship and Crynoids  
**_Getting used to having company again._

He's about as happy with his unwanted guest as he was when he discovered Tegan lurking on board his ship, oh so long ago. He rants and grumbles and lectures and doesn't check his rudeness at times, but despite his bluster, Martha stays firm. She's staying. He needs her, and she wants to see the universe. She's had a taste and it's addicted her.

The TARDIS seems to agree, and refuses to return to any point reasonably near the date and location of the University. What is it with the female gender and ganging up on him? Must be the latest regeneration.

They wind up on a posh sort of planet that reminds him, with a twinge to his hearts, of New-New York. Flying cars and sparkling cities; the air is clean, and they have a heart about nature. He's instantly suspicious.

He's rather smug about his instincts, even when they wind up locked in an archaic dungeon without the sonic screwdriver, and a madman is planning on cultivating a few dozen Crynoids, for what reason the Doctor has no idea.

Martha to the rescue again, showing off lock-picking skills that remind him vaguely of Jo Grant, and a chemist's adeptness to medical liquids that does the same to the memories of Liz Shaw. The twinge he gets as they dunk the Crynoid pods into the bucket of make-your-own-weed killer is for a different reason, but it hurts just the same.

He decides later that perhaps having Martha around isn't a bad idea.


	4. Story 4: War Wounds

**Pathways in Time**

**Story 4 – War Wounds  
**_Take one Jack, a pinch of Torchwood, a dash of interdimensional carnivore, and stir._

Things run smoothly for a few months; no evil dictators threatening their decapitation, no alien invasions of galactic scale, no Daleks to glide in at the last second and screech EX-TERM-IN-ATE in the rather monotonous way that they do.

Then a run-in with a temporal Vortesaur while gliding through the Vortex throws everything for a loop. Ramsey, perhaps, or maybe one of his descendants; the thought gives him another twinge for Charlie, which he angrily locks away. The TARDIS materializes somewhere on the edge of Cardiff, Wales, and right into the laps of Torchwood-3.

None are more surprised to see them at the scene of the emergence then one Jack Harkness. None are more flustered, awed, and pissed as all hell either. Thankfully the appearance of Ramsey-the-Second out of the spatial rift prevents Jack from doing too much harm to the baffled Time Lord.

Martha still gets to put her schooling to use, once the inter-dimensional bird of prey has been tossed back into the Vortex, and he manages to explain a few things to Jack. The man is considerably subdued and willing to listen; especially after the Doctor alone witnessed him get up from a fall that should've liquefied him.

_Yes, I regenerated. Yes, Rose is alive. No, we can't reach her._

_No, I can't undo what she did._

_You've changed_, Jack notes thoughtfully out loud, and he has to pause and consider it. He still darts about like a hummingbird on Red Bull, still prattles his way out of situations with rapidfire technobabble, but some of that enthusiasm has been lost. He's quieter. But that's alright.

Jack's changed too.

He offers to take Jack with them, but the ex-Time Agent declines. Torchwood still needs him around for a while yet.


	5. Story 5: Precursor

**Pathways in Time**

**Story 5 – Precursor  
**_The quest for lost memories leads to all sorts of trouble. Leads straight into Glitz and Glamour._

They spend a month or two doing what they always do, before they discover something startling about his old companion's past.

And a new lead on those missing two years that burns a hole in Jack's brain.

They wind up back in Cardiff, 3 years off their target date, and Jack's there waiting for them. He's groomed Gwen to take over, and the city is calm, for once. He can afford to leave.

This time, when he asks, Jack says yes.

They set off into the vortex, hot on the trail of Jack's lost past, and he bites down the twinge that it brings to share stories over chips, doing the saving-the-world bit with old and new friends at his side once more.

The new quirk develops on the planet Johsan, much to Martha and Jack's chagrin.

Martha locked up by the resident megalomaniac, and Time Agents out for Jack's hide. He nearly has a coronary when Jack runs afoul of the bastards who were responsible for the amnesia trouble, and winds up in the dirt at the Time Lord's feet, his blood pooling like paint over a gossamer canvas, lifeless eyes gazing to the stars.

He's so relieved that he actually kisses the man – really kisses him, not just a peck on the cheek – when Jack rouses from his sprawled position and cracks a dry joke, sufficiently spooking his would-be murderers.

Later he admonishes himself for forgetting Jack's new powers. He's still getting used to the fact, after all. He doesn't think it'll be the last time he forgets, either. He starts doing a fine mother-hen impression over his two charges after that, but he's trying to stop. No, really, he is.

The good news is they got the memory disk. The bad news is that they can't return the memories to Jack's head. But Jack's still hanging around. He suspects Martha has sweet-talked him into sticking around for a while. Secretly, he's utterly grateful, and makes a mental note to take them to the Eye of Orion.

They never quite make it.

The Doctor sighed, his hands shoved in his pockets as he glared ruefully at the tea kettle, floating three inches below the kitchen ceiling. "Jack, do you know anyplace to make a good pit stop?"


End file.
